A former Cabinet minister has questioned why nurses earning £35,000 a year should need to use food banks. Speaking on BBC Radio Tees, Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland Tory MP Simon Clarke said if nurses earning that “average” salary were relying on handouts, “something is wrong with your budgeting”.
The Liz Truss supporter, who was secretary of state for levelling up under her brief premiership, told the radio station the debate over nurses’ pay had got “way out of hand”.
Mr Clarke said: “I’m afraid if you are using a food bank and you are earning the average nurse’s salary of £35,000 a year then something is wrong with your budgeting, because £35,000 a year is not a salary on which you ought to be relying on a food bank. This debate has got way out of hand.”
After telling the station the £35,000 figure was the median nurse’s salary which he sourced from the Nursing Times, he added: “My message is everyone needs to take responsibility in their lives.
“I don’t believe people on an average salary of £35,000 a year need to be using food banks.”
NHS figures show pay is according to a banding system with newly qualified nurses starting on Band 5 with a starting salary of £27,055 a year in England (increased somewhat in London). Band 6 nurses earn £33,706 to £40,588, while Band 7 nurses earn between £41,659 and £47,672 a year. They are also paid unsocial hours payments in addition to basic pay.
RCN general secretary Pat Cullen did not comment on his claim that the average salary was £35,000 but said: “To criticise anybody using a food bank is disgusting, heartless and dangerously out of touch. I have toured the length and breadth of this country and met nursing staff from every corner of the nation – and their fear and fright about not being able to meet their bills is palpable.
“Sky-high inflation means some nursing staff are living on a financial knife edge and even their own employer, NHS trusts across the country, are being forced to open food banks to feed their staff. This is not their fault – every nurse out there spends their professional and personal lives looking at how they can make savings, how they can treat more patients with less staff, how they can make their ever-decreasing budget stretch further.
“When nurses are having to pay hundreds of pounds a month just to get to work, can’t afford to put food on the table and are forced to cut back on shifts because they can’t afford ever-increasing childcare costs, something is seriously wrong.”
After his comments were widely shared, Mr Clarke said: “I am very clear that we all owe nurses a great debt of admiration for the vital work they deliver on our behalf. However, it is vital that we recognise that a 19% pay increase is simply not realistic.
“It would not be fair to the taxpaying public and it would worsen and prolong the inflation challenge.”
